An agency that provides home care to the elderly in Cornwall has been put into special measures

What did the inspection find?

"Inspectors found the service was short-staffed. The provider and the deputy manager were often completing care visits as the service did not have enough staff available to provide all planned care visits.

"The service did not have systems in place to record details of missed visits, investigate why visits had been missed or to try to identify learning where things had gone wrong.

"People were not always supported safely with their medicines.

"Medicines administration records (MARs) were not consistently completed and it was not possible to confirm from the records if people had been safely supported with their medicines.

"Some people required their medication at specific times and the recent unreliability of the service's visit times meant these needs had not been met.

"Inspectors had significant concerns about the service's performance.

"People were unnecessarily exposed to the risk of harm because of the service's unreliability and use of inappropriate staff.

"As a result, on the last day of the inspection, inspectors wrote to the provider to request an urgent explanation as to how they intended to address and resolve these issues.

"A response was required by 9th September but was not provided".

Care Quality Commission Inspection

Curae Home Care is rated 'Inadequate' for providing safe and well-led care and 'Inadequate' overall: Read the full report.

Curae Home Care, based in Bodmin, has been rated 'inadequate' by the health watchdog

What do inspectors say?

"This report made for concerning reading.

"As a result of this inspection, we had no choice but to use our urgent enforcement powers to protect the people who were living at Curae Home Care as well as suspend the 'Good' rating of the service.

"We appreciate that this has been a difficult time for everyone involved.

"Our first priority is always the welfare of the people who are using care service.

"As with all enforcement action the provider has the right to appeal any decision made and so it would be inappropriate to discuss further until all processes are complete".

Deputy Chief Inspector of Adult Social Care at CQC, Debbie Ivanova

Cornwall Council says it became aware of and reported issues relating to Curae Home Care at the end of August.

“Cornwall Council welcomes the report published today by the Care Quality Commission(CQC).

"We became aware of issues with the Curae Care agency towards the end of August and shared this information with CQC.

“The Council directly commissioned care for 15 people and we moved quickly to transfer their care to an alternative provider.

"We were also able to provide support to people who pay for their own care to help them find another care agency”.

Cornwall Council

Pirate FM has contacted Curae Home Care for a statement and is waiting for a response.